{"id":568705,"date":"2026-04-06T23:01:07","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T23:01:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/568705\/"},"modified":"2026-04-06T23:01:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T23:01:07","slug":"mets-place-juan-soto-on-injured-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/568705\/","title":{"rendered":"Mets Place Juan Soto On Injured List"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Mets announced that outfielder Juan Soto<\/a> has been placed on the 10-day injured list due to a right calf strain. The move is retroactive to April 4th but the club also announced the typical return timeline as two to three weeks. Infielder Ronny Mauricio<\/a> has been recalled from Triple-A Syracuse as the corresponding move.<\/p>\n

Soto departed Friday\u2019s game with what the club called right calf soreness. Soto later told members of the media that he had a minor strain and would go day to day to see how he felt. After a couple of days of monitoring the situation, it seems the club will let him sit out for a while to rest up.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not a major issue but it\u2019s obviously not ideal for a player of Soto\u2019s caliber to be subtracted from the lineup. He is one of the best hitters on the planet, with a career .282\/.417\/.531 line and 158 wRC+. His 18.6% walk rate is almost three ticks better than anyone else in the league. From 2018 to the present, Aaron Judge<\/a> is second on the list with a 16% walk rate.<\/p>\n

The timing is also a bit awkward. The Mets moved Soto to left field to begin the season and gave the right field job to prospect Carson Benge<\/a>. Though Benge is talented, he has a .100\/.206\/.200 line through 34 plate appearances. Some of that is due to an unlucky .111 batting average on balls in play but he has also struck out in 32.4% of his plate appearances.<\/p>\n

If the Mets had any thought of sending Benge down for a reset, that may be harder to do now that Soto is out, so they may be left with a floundering Benge in one corner and a patchwork solution in the other. On top of that, Brett Baty<\/a> has missed the past few games due to a jammed left thumb while Jorge Polanco<\/a> has an Achilles issue that is limiting him to designated hitter duty.<\/p>\n

None of the issues are majors in a vacuum but the little bits add up to a challenging shuffle. Mark Vientos<\/a> is covering first with Polanco in the DH spot. Baty could step into the outfield for Soto if his thumb feels better. If not, Jared Young<\/a> and Tyrone Taylor<\/a> could pick up some playing time.<\/p>\n

As for Mauricio, he probably won\u2019t play much behind the infield of shortstop Francisco Lindor<\/a>, second baseman Marcus Semien<\/a> and third baseman Bo Bichette<\/a>. The Mets have been playing without a traditional backup infielder, comfortable with Bichette as a backup shortstop and guys like Baty and Vientos potential backups elsewhere. With Baty banged up, Mauricio gives them a bit more conventional cover.<\/p>\n

Even if he doesn\u2019t play much, it may be a notable transaction for him for other reasons. He came into this season with one option remaining and a service time count of two years and 31 days. Since he hasn\u2019t yet spent 20 days on optional assignment this year, he hasn\u2019t burned that final option. He also still has a path to get to three years of service in 2026, though getting sent back down later in the year could prevent him from getting there. Where he finishes the year could impact his path to arbitration and\/or free agency.<\/p>\n

Photo courtesy of Jeff Curry, Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Mets announced that outfielder Juan Soto has been placed on the 10-day injured list due to a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":565151,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[7842,33988,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-568705","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-juan-soto","9":"tag-ronny-mauricio","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=568705"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568705\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/565151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=568705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=568705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=568705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}